


In what torn ship so ever I embark

by witheredsong



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-12
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-20 10:39:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4784315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witheredsong/pseuds/witheredsong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Seal then this bill of my divorce to all,<br/>On whom those fainter beams of love did fall"</p>
            </blockquote>





	In what torn ship so ever I embark

**Author's Note:**

> AU for season 1, episode 12.

Before the axe falls and the head rolls off, obscene, like something out of a nightmare where young boys with ancient eyes play with skulls, Arthur looks down for a second at the courtyard, and sees Gwen, Guinevere, being restrained by Merlin, struggling to break free and reach her father. Her hair is wild, her eyes are red and her hands are curled into claws. As if she feels his regard, she looks up at him, and the look makes him flinch. There are no tears, eaten up by hate and loss. The dull sound of blade meeting flesh breaks the moment, and then Arthur shivers, as Gwen wails loud, unearthly, “Father…”. Her voice is carried away by the wind that blows over Camelot, taking with it the smell of blood, the cruelty of injustice masquerading as justice.

Uther, Arthur notices, in the weak sunlight streaming the throne room, looks smaller, fragile. The lines of wrinkles fanning out the corners of his eyes and lips are more pronounced, deepening into grooves. Arthur knows the winter makes his father’s old battle wounds hurt, but can’t find it within himself to commiserate. It has been three months since Tom died. Since Morgana stopped speaking with Uther. Arthur feels disconnected from everything going on around him. Things come to him as if in a dream, unreal, as he sleepwalks through his duties.

He has always loved his father, always put Uther and his own duty to Camelot before anything, anyone else. It had been one and the same. Now, he wonders and wonders. He doesn’t hate his father, he couldn’t, as he watches Uther’s fingers tremble and fail to hold the pen with which to sign the long-awaited, long delayed peace treaty with Mercia. His shoulder wound must ache like an abomination.

Arthur hates Uther the king. His hate is renewed every time he watches Morgana, her beauty now grown dazzling like a blade, look at Uther with death in her eyes. He hates, how he hates when he catches a sight of Gwen moving around Morgana’s chambers like a white ghost, her smile lost, her words silenced. She hasn’t spoken for three months. She flinches every time she espies Uther, and looks through Arthur as if he were glass. She will suffer only Morgana, Gaius or Merlin to speak to or touch her.

His father needs him, Arthur knows. He moves forward, near to his father, holds his hand to make sure his grip on the pen is secure and guides him, and the signature to the document is finally done, Arthur now Uther’s right hand, his sword-bearing arm, literally. A great cheer goes up in the hall, strange and unnatural to Arthur whose world has been silence for the last few months. As he straightens, he finds Merlin watching him, the ghost of the old smile on his lips, and Arthur wonders what his manservant sees with his great all-seeing eyes when he looks at Arthur like that.

Something unclenches within him at Merlin’s warm regard.

His father stands up and places a hand on his shoulder. Arthur knows it looks like approval to the assembled nobles, but in reality, Uther is leaning on him, using him to stand straight, strong and proud.

Uther proclaims to the hall, mainly to the Mercian nobles, still chafing under the humiliating treaty wrought on them by Arthur’s devastating campaign on the borders, “Prince Arthur, the defender of Camelot and my strength!’’, a veiled threat and promise.

Arthur stands proudly, impassively in the great hall, bearing his father’s weight, burnished to something bright and gold, pure and burning.

He thinks, Not for you Father, but for my people, I shall be strong. And when I rule I shall know love begets mercy, not vengeance.

 

\---------------------------------------

It’s summer, the wind is balmy and Arthur is standing on the terrace leading from his room. Bright moonlight floods Camelot. Behind him, he can hear Merlin moving about, preparing for Arthur’s going to bed. Things are easier between them now, since that stolen moment in the throne-room, when Merlin’s gaze made Arthur feel as if he had surfaced from drowning. Merlin still won’t go near Uther, and he still addresses Arthur as Sire, the mocking inflection which made it a game between them lost.

He senses rather than hears Merlin’s pained exclamation and the clang of metal on the stone floor, turns to see blood welling from Merlin’s hand, his sword on the floor, gleaming in the fire dully.

“Merlin, you idiot!”, he exclaims, forgetting that he is no longer allowed, takes Merlin’s injured hand in his own, and inspects the cut. It’s small but deep, blood still oozing. Merlin has gone utterly still beside him, barely breathing. He looks up and Merlin’s eyes, suspiciously bright, flutter close, as if guarding against some greater hurt Arthur can inflict on him. Arthur’s heart breaks. He touches Merlin’s eyelids, whispers so softly he doubts Merlin can hear, “I would never hurt you, I could never. Believe me please. I am not my…”

Before he can finish what he’s saying, Merlin, the eternally unpredictable, Merlin the idiot, Merlin whose eyes anchor him, surges up and takes his lips, like a man starving while at a feast, like someone fulfilling a destiny. He reaches up to cradle Arthur’s face tenderly with his wounded hand. His blood is in Arthur’s hair, his face, his tunic, merges with Merlin’s taste in his mouth, and he is soaring for one moment, like a hawk in the sun. Then he stumbles back because Merlin heaves away from the kiss, his face devastated, bleak. He speaks as if a prophecy:

“Kings cannot have all they want Sire. And you will be the greatest that ever lived.”

He walks out of the room, leaving Arthur alone in the moonlight, marked by his blood.

Merlin, unattainable. Merlin, beloved.

 

\------------------------

Merlin’s magic, when he comes to know of it, is a searing betrayal. Yet, watching Merlin waving a hand over his side, pierced by a spear, feeling through the intense agony the skin knitting back, he can’t be angry, not when he sees Merlin’s eyes are gold and scared, his face filled with love and fear, just before the world grows dark. Mercia has attacked with the news of Uther’s mortal illness, a harsh winter has weakened Arthur’s army, and yet he fights to preserve his people, his Camelot.

He comes to with the stinging blow on his cheek. Merlin is bent over him, his eyes blue again, tears falling on Arthur’s face. “Wake up, Arthur, please…” he hears Merlin beg, his voice broken. “I can’t do this without you.”

Merlin is holding him in his arms, rocking back and forth like he’s a baby, and strange how Arthur is so at peace in a battlefield, bodies of Mercians scattered around him, the land torn apart as if in a great storm, safe within the arms of a sorcerer, a betrayer, a friend.

He sighs into Merlin’s shoulder, “Let me go. I’m okay.” Merlin’s arms clench around him once, and then let go. Arthur feels bereft.

He looks at Merlin’s face, shining with tears and joy, leans forward and kisses him, soft, chaste, on the mouth. Merlin draws a shuddery breath.

Arthur puts a finger on Merlin’s lips and says, quietly, “One day, I will be king, but not yet.”

Merlin tries to apologize, knows Arthur knows he has magic, looks torn because of his deception. Arthur calmly says, holding Merlin’s hand over his heart, “Be my strength Merlin, my armour.”

No more, no less.

That is, after all, their destiny.

 

\-------------------------

On the day he is to be crowned king, he lies beneath a shroud in the chapel, in front of the altar, the entire night. He prays, he asks how he can make reparations for his father’s sins, he promises away his life to God for the sake of his people. Just before dawn, the lights of the torches flicker, the ground trembles where he lies in the sacred darkness. He feels bright light envelop him, a voice like the ringing of cymbals declare, You pay with your happiness, Arthur. With your love. You pay with life.

When the young King walks out of the sanctum sanctorum, his face is bright as the sun and his hands are white like snow. People sink in obeisance as he passes, his eyes dreaming of visions granted only to the blessed.

Arthur walks out into the garden, in the bright summer sunlight, and the birds stop singing, the whole world seems to hold its breath.

Merlin is there, a circle of scorched flowers around him. His face is serene, the fathomless peace of someone who has lost all. He smiles at Arthur.

Arthur says, “Now I am King.”

Together they walk in the sunshine.


End file.
